For twenty years the Netherlands’ greatest artist Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn lived and worked in a house in the heart of Amsterdam, now The Rembrandt House Museum. The house has been meticulously refurbished with furniture, art, and objects from that time–mostly reproductions.

This was the perfect size museum to visit since we knew we wouldn’t have time to see the Rijksmuseum and Rembrandt’s famous Night Watch.  We spent about an hour touring the house with an audio headset.

Visitors see…snippets of personality, the idiosyncrasies that made him the innovator he was.  

                                            David de Witt

 

kitchen area

During Rembrandt’s time there were no bedrooms in homes and people slept in closet beds, which were fairly short, as no one slept lying down, thinking they might die if they did. People slept propped against a few pillows.  This bed was in the kitchen.

Rembrandt purchased the house with a mortgage in 1639… At this time Rembrandt had already established his reputation as an artist. In the same year he bought the house, he was awarded the prestigious commission to paint the Night Watch. Although he was earning a lot of money, Rembrandt was unable—or unwilling—to pay off the mortgage…was forced into bankruptcy. In 1656 Rembrandt’s property was inventoried for the benefit of his creditors, and his household effects and collection of art and curiosities were sold.

This room held Rembrandt’s vast collection of curiosities to showcase the wonders of man and nature.  Everything from shells, coral, animal carcasses, busts of emperors, weapons, weapons, and a lion skin.

On the top floor of the house there are several student cubicles where the painter cultivated and promoted new talent.

The museum has an impressive collection of Rembrandt etchings (original and reproductions) exhibited in a darkened room and rotated to preserve the original etchings.

Without atmosphere a painting is nothing. 

Rembrandt